Monday, May 24, 2010

Daley and gun control: Genuine passion or phony baloney?

Just like Memorial Day comes and goes every year, Mayor Daley’s proposed gun packages come and go every year. He gets red in the face. He’s basically trying to divert attention from the fact that in many communities in Chicago -- unfortunately, disproportionately, the African American neighborhoods and Hispanic neighborhoods -- gun violence is intolerable, unacceptable and out of control.

And so the mayor has a political tactic where he comes out there, starts screaming, gets red in the face, proposes gun control legislation to send to Springfield, and doesn’t lift a finger to get that legislation passed. He doesn’t used his political strength and muscle to pass the legislation. Just a bunch of baloney.

And Mayor Daley, as politicians go, in my opinion, is more real than most. But he sure has his qualities of baloney, too. And this is an example of it.

And what he oughta do is, he oughta really reorganize and figure out what he’s going to do about making sure that he can address the inequities on public safety. And in the poor African American neighborhoods, it’s not enough after 20 years, Mayor, to keep saying every year you want gun control legislation. At some point, man, it takes – it’s your responsibility.

When I was the governor I suggested helping you out. And you grudgingly accepted it because from a public relations standpoint you couldn’t turn it away. But you mocked it.

OK, by now you've realized that the speaker was former Gov. Rod Blagojevich. These words were transcribed from the second hour of his weekly radio talk show yesterday. He went on:

And Mayor Daley is mostly trying to do it right. He’s different from most of these phony politicians. But when it comes to gun control and the stuff he does, it’s baloney.

Because if you really cared, Mayor, you’d muscle [Chicago Democratic Ill. Rep. John] D’Amico, who works in streets and sanitation, Rep. D’Amico, you’d muscle that guy. [Chicago Democratic Ill. Rep. Harry] Osterman, another double-dipper who works for you [Chicago Democratic Ill. Rep]. Susana Mendoza, another double-dipper who works for you. They work for you first before they work for their constituents in their districts. They’re part-time, $75,000 a year job as state reps is basically there there to take marching orders from you.

You ought to send them down to Springfield and you oughta to say to them, “You’re not voting for a budget until we get some of these downstaters to vote for some of these gun control legislation.” The legislation that you say is going to solve the gun violence problem in Chicago.

If you really mean it, Mayor, use some influence and use that strength that you have to go do it. But the reality is, you don’t.

I used to ask you to let me help you, when I was governor, to pass these things. And you’d give me that usual --this is what the mayor does, here’s an insight from the inside. When he doesn’t want to give an answer, Mayor Daley kinda just looks down in one place, and he says the same thing over and over again. He kinda mumbles:

“It’ll be all right. It’ll be all right, It’ll be all right.”

“Hey, mayor, I want to help you pass the gun control stuff. Now, why don’t we go down the list of your people and see how we can divide whom we lobby and then figure out ways to be able to get them to support some of these things and find linkage with other legislation. What do you think, mayor??

“It’ll be all right. It’ll be all right, It’ll be all right.”

“Hey, Mayor. I’d like to help you with the National Guard maybe. Maybe be can free up some police officers in the safer neighborhoods, and maybe some administrative work can be done with some of our National Guardsmen. Not put them in the street. But maybe we can find some creative way to free up some manpower, then you can send them into the the tougher neighborhoods where the gang bangers outnumber cops 75 to 1 . Seventy-five gang bangers to every Chicago Police officer, that’ s an unfair fight. It’s unfair to the police officers and their families to put them into fights like that. Why not give them some reinforcements, Mayor? Can we help you?”

“It’ll be all right. It’ll be all right, It’ll be all right.”

The same mumbling answer when he doesn’t want to answer a question. That’s what it’s like to deal with the mayor. It’s just baloney.…

I believe in the fundamental rights of hunters and sportsmen and hunting rifles but I do think banning assault weapons, sensible gun registration laws, way to be able to give law enforcement ways to go after those who are channeling illegal guns, there’s e a lot of things that make a lot of sense that the NRA opposes because they have their own political agenda.

So I generally support what the mayor is supporting, but what I don’t like and what I think is completely dishonest is that he didn’t intend to pass it. It’s all baloney.

He did this with the federal package too, When I was a congressman he would come out to Washington pushing this federal package and they never saw these guys again. And of course it never passed. And then the pro gun control lawmakers get up and give speech and the NRA guys get up and give speeches and nothing changes.

Yes, granted, Blago is daffy and has been swinging wildly lately, but his assessment of Daley does have the ring of truth, doesn't it?

Posted at 10:31:51 AM

Comments

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As much as it pains me to admit it, there is an air of reality in these remarks. Who'd have thunk it?

In the 15 years I've lived here and followed city politics, I've never gotten the impression that Mayor Daley cares about *anything* (civics-wise) other than his own political career or what he wants personally out of the job. Even when he makes decisions or dubious deals that backfire on him in the press, he seems to have made shrewd or instinctual decision that the cost won't outweigh the benefits to him personally or politically. About the one thing that doesn't appear to be politically calculated is his buffoonish and often childishly petulant public behavior.

He has an born instinct for politics; at times his decisions coincidentally benefit the city, but I've concluded that he doesn't make of decisions on the basis of the public good. I don't see why this issue would be different. I don't own a gun, I think more guns in Chicago is a bad idea, and I don't have a lot of respect for the NRA, but I don't know why we allow the the mayor to get away with ignoring the statistics that pretty much prove that a gun ban is not working here. He needs to be held to a higher standard. Cleaning up violent gun crime is not an impossible task; other U.S. cities have had success. With the astounding amount of power Daley has, Chicagoans should require him to actually show some results or come up with a better solution.

On one hand, we have a politician that is daffy. So daffy in fact, he has his own radio show (in between appearances on reality shows) just to boost his own ego. He loves hearing his own voice, and saying controversial things, just to get attention. Like talking about Governor Quinn's bits. Egomaniac par none. This has been drilled into my head for the last couple of years at CoS.

EXCEPT...this one instance where he is talking about another politician that has been in office over twenty years, and has been re-elected time and time again by some of the biggest landslides in Illinois history. He talks about him in a very frank manner and in not so flattering terms. No other politician has ever talked about Daley this way publicly.

And yet the conclusion we come to is not 'Blago is an egomaniac saying controversial things to get attention' like we have done thousands of time before...but instead...'Wow...Blago is spot on!'??

Please. Find me a few NON-DISGRACED politicians that aren't ego driven to say these things about Mayor Daley (who has been in office most of his adult life...and has a track record light years long) before I'll believe it. Sheesh, even Zorn, watchdog of the public interest has never called the mayor out like this. And if the mayor was so brazen, you think *someone* would have.

Daley's support for a useless, and unconstitutional, gun ban is just a smoke screen for him to hide behind. He can pretend he's against inner city violence by protesting the legal ownership of guns, yet he's done nothing to address the massive amount of gun related violence committed by criminals who have no problems getting weapons whenever they want.

"...has never called the mayor out like this. And if the mayor was so brazen, you think *someone* would have."

I think this is one of those things that is just common knowledge. The newspaper doesn't have to tell you the sky is blue - look up. Eric Zorn doesn't have to tell you Daley's gun policies don't work - take a ride through the south side on a Friday or Saturday night if you dare.

And for once, Blago is talking about someone other than himself (well, barely), AND the quote has nothing to do with his pending day in court. In other words, Blago has nothing to gain by this discussion of Daley by lying, so why bother?

Any time the mayor wants to get serious about the crime problem Chicago is experiencing he need only call in his police chief and say "Bring all of our repeat offenders or you're fired." If Chicago's career criminals were locked up there would be no crime problem and you could literally have "guns on the street" and it would be no more than a tire hazard. But the mayor doesn't want to get serious. The voters of Chicago need to ask why.

Daley doesn't want the ordinary, law abiding citizen to have a handgun in their home, but Daley has 24/7 armed police bodyguards.
It is believed to be 36 are assigned to protect his corrupt, mumbling body!

But we can't legally have a gun in the house for protection.
What a crock & what a phony!

What do Daley, Hitler, Mao, Obama, Castro, Kim Yong Il, and Stalin have in common? All were gun grabbers. Only slaves are disarmed. Only slaves write articles calling for guns. If guns kill people, do pencils misspell words? Ted Kennedy has killed more people than my gun. Gotta love Daley, son of a mob boss and corrupt to the core, but I guess he cares about us. Much like Obama and the Goldman Sachs bankers care for us. Thanks Tribune for jumping in bed with Tyranny again. Why not play the race card like other liberal publications? If someone goes against liberals its obviously racist. Gotta love our media in the US of A. Liberals will drug their kids with ritalin and prozac, but my god dont ever give them a gun for self defense.. Since the Chicago gun ban, crime has gone through the roof. Please send the National Guard to protect us. Posse Comitatus doesnt exist to liberals. Our poor forefathers warned us against this tyranny. And liberals play along. Liberalism is a mental disorder

Ask the Mayor about the time up at the family place in Mich.twenty years back when his kid was having a party and brandished a shotgun belonging to his family and left un-secured for kids to grab during an un-shaperoned party.

Daley has been a protected little boy-king since birth and has ALWAYS had harsh men ready to do violence to protect his family. He has NO RIGHT to speak about the subject--he wants serfs unarmed and naked begging at his feet. His day is over soon, hopefully.

ANd, once again, the NRA never got involved in politics until dingbats started to try and take away their rights circa 1968. President Kennedy was a proud NRA Life-Member and commended them on teaching American Citizens the use of arms (look it up if you doubt that fact). The NRA and it's 4 million members spend countless hours donating time and energy to coach youth, cops, hunters, women, ALL COMERS who are law abiding citizens in use of arms. Give up demonizing them,they protect civil liberties and prevent Holocausts from re-occuring (as do kindred groups like jpfo.org). Nazi's can't run camps and gestapo can't round up citizens who bear arms--that *is* flat fact.

Daley is a hyprocrite and a criminal. My grandparents left Sicily to escape political and mafia corruption only to find it exists in the US govt and cities today. There is not much difference between Daley and La Cosa Nostra. Enough of this Chicago slave state he runs. He is corrupt to the core and should be in a federal prison not running the City.

A guy who's aggressively trying to sound "certifiable" before his high profile trial, calls a fellow liberal/progressive (Oh heck, he's a freakin' thug) on not "trying harder" for gun control "success".

Yeah, that's advice I want to take.

Never mind that after a two year record run on citizens buying guns, crime rates are now at 30 years lows.

Never mind that 48 states have legal concealed carry and not one of the "blood will run in the streets" predictions has come to pass - anywhere except gun free Chicago that is.

Yes, all those other states with lower crime rates are wrong and Daley and Blago are right. We need more of Daley's gun control.

Of course ... if Daley assigned some of the over 1000 cops we're short of to that area, and the violence stopped in Englewood and Chatham, there might be a stable political base to field serious African American and Hispanic mayoral and aldermanic candidates without Daley's blessing.

I'm not sure Daley is in any king of hurry to solve the violence problem.

It's easier to blame suburban gun stores and target shooters in Kankakee than his own administration.

Nope, Blago is full of it as usual. First of all, if all it took to get gun control passed was to set Osterman loose on Springfield, those laws would be on the books by now. Osterman has been digging for gun bans (not hyperbole here, honest-to-Heston gun bans, that required Illinoisans to turn in various "bad" guns to the state police within 90 days) for years, and he has more than once come within a few votes. Blagojevich is making this up as he goes along, and his story of how he eloquently tried and tried to get Da Mayor to accept his help has the ring of every BS story told by every wannabe in the 6th grade since the beginning of time. He's the hero, he's smooth, he has all the answers, and Daley can only mumble in the face of Blago's heroics. That has the ring of truth? Not to me.

I'm not here to defend Daley--if he did manage to pass his gun control package, it wouldn't hurt anybody except law-abiding people who own guns for legitimate reasons--but to point out that Blago is no "insider." He's a professional son-in-law.

Does no one remember Blago's term in the U.S. House? When he did nothing but grandstand with elaborate gun control proposals, lying about bullets the size of ketchup bottles and snipers shooting people in Wrigley Field from the top of the Sears Tower? He spent years doing what he accuses Daley of doing. Essentially, what we have here is an incompetent, arrogant liar telling us that a petulant, arrogant liar is dishonest.

Ok all I want to know is how will this gun ban help? The guy's we hear about on the news time and time again didnt go through a background check. They dont have foid cards. They dont follow laws i.e "OMG a gun ban? Im sorry I better give this gun back to the guy I stole it from!"

There hard core punk gang bangers that DONT FOLLOW laws or bans. Yeah Daley's got it right. Take the gun from the home of the average Joe that busts his butt to make a dime , But gosh darn it leave those poor crimanals alone!

Seams to me the money spent by him on trying to keep the bans alive would be better spent putting a few more cops on the ground to get the guns from the crimanals.

And as a side note I have no idea why anyone would listen to Blogo. He's a nut case.

Can any war loving Obama liberal please help me come to grips with how a gun ban will help lower the crime rate? Please note I dont take Anti Depressants, have white guilt, or pay $5 a cup for fair trade coffee, and make of Bush but no Obama for doing the same policies. Yes we can

Hey Zorn....enlighten me...I would like to know the difference between an "assault weapon" and a hunting rifle...oh btw we can't hunt with rifles in Illinois, so maybe you should rephrase that with shotgun....don't give your social commentary about things you have very little, if any understanding of. Learn about guns, then make your decision. You must have been in the room when the people that organized the '94 Clinton Assault Weapons ban decided which guns to ban by opening up the Shotgun news and circling the guns they though "looked scary" lmao. That's true, too...look it up. They decided a Ruger Mini 14 with synthetic stock was illegal...hmm but the wood stock Mini wasn't...same gun, one with a wood stock the other with a plastic....give anyone enough rope and they will embarrass themselves to people who do know the facts....

ZORN REPLY -- So many of you gun nuts are knee-jerk, knuckle-dragging idiots like our friend "Marty" here. Does he know my views on the assault weapons issue, which are not expressed here? Has he researched them? Clearly no, he has not. Yet in his typical gun-mad frenzy he assumes he does and lectures me on not knowing the facts.

I'm not putting words in EZ's mouth and he can always correct any misperceptions.

No, EZ probably can't tell you if the bolt carrier in your AR is M-16 or AR legal or whether your disconnector in your FCG will pass muster with those pinheads at the BATFE lab.

But, FWIW, for a Progressive EZ has been (surprisingly) open to the idea of CC for Illinois. No, he's not a shooting sports person, that I'm aware of. But for several years he has been very consistent on supporting the 2nd amendment and the rights of law abiding citizens to keep and use firearms to protect their homes and families and enjoy the shooting sports.

Just because you don't agree with his other policies and politics, (Lord knows I don't) you can't assume he's some kind of Daley-esque gun grabber.

He isn't. But since he seems to recognize that the 2nd may be as important as the 1st, there's still hope for the boy.

About "Change of Subject."

"Change of Subject" by Chicago Tribune op-ed columnist Eric Zorn contains observations, reports, tips, referrals and tirades, though not necessarily in that order. Links will tend to expire, so seize the day. For an archive of Zorn's latest Tribune columns click here. An explanation of the title of this blog is here. If you have other questions, suggestions or comments, send e-mail to ericzorn at gmail.com.
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Contributing editor Jessica Reynolds is a 2012 graduate of Loyola University Chicago and is the coordinator of the Tribune's editorial board. She can be reached at jreynolds at tribune.com.